Arctic Fire (7 page)

J
ACK SAT
at the table in Bill and Cheryl’s kitchen, thinking about what had happened in the plane as he gazed at his laptop and then at a tall glass of red wine standing beside it. He was going to spend the night here. His cramped apartment was another half hour away, and he didn’t feel like driving after what had happened.

The fact that Bill had turned around and picked him up had been surprising. Shocking, really. They hadn’t said a word to each other all the way home. But getting the ride had been a lot better than hiking all the way back to the mansion to get his car.

As he glanced out the wide bay window and into the darkness, he heard someone coming down the long hallway toward the kitchen.

“Hello, Jack.”

“Hi, Cheryl.” He stood up and gave her a kiss on the cheek as she passed him to get a glass of wine for herself. “What are you
doing still up?” He eased back into his chair, relieved that it was Cheryl and not Bill.

She was tall, slim, blonde, and elegant. She was fifty-eight but looked ten years younger.

“I couldn’t sleep.” She ran her fingers through his dark hair lovingly as she sat down beside him with her wine. “So what happened? Why did I have to make Bill turn around and get you?”

Of course, Jack realized. They must have spoken after Bill roared away from the small airport, and she’d shamed him into going back. She was the only one in the world who could.

“I chickened out,” he admitted. He wasn’t proud of it, but he wasn’t going to lie. “But damn it, I hate heights and I’m not qualified to solo, especially at night.”

“Bill had you jumping out of that plane
by yourself
?” she asked incredulously. “At night?”

He didn’t want to be that whining kid. He’d never accepted pity, and he never would. “It’s done,” he said quietly. “Let’s just leave it at that.”

She gazed at him for a few moments as she sipped her wine, and then she gestured at the laptop’s screen. “Anything interesting?”

Jack pointed at the article he’d been reading on the
New York Times
website. “We blew away some mountain town in Afghanistan yesterday that was supposed to be a terrorist base.” He’d seen a quick story about it yesterday afternoon on Yahoo!, but the
Times
article had more details. “We blasted the place to hell with cruise missiles, but it turns out all we did was kill a bunch of innocent civilians. No terrorists.”

“You got a problem with that, Jack?”

Jack and Cheryl glanced up in surprise as Bill walked into the kitchen in his precise military stride. Neither of them had heard him coming down the long hallway.

“Yeah, I do,” Jack answered, impressed as always by how quietly Bill could move despite his size. “A few of them, actually.”

“Now, boys,” Cheryl murmured uneasily.

“Like what?” Bill demanded as he sat down in the chair opposite Jack’s.

“To start with, we killed a bunch of innocent civilians. And, according to the article, that included some kids.”

“How do you know those people were
all
innocent?”

“The article said they were just townspeople. They probably didn’t even know the United States existed.”

“And you believe the article?”

“Sure.”

“You’ll never learn,” Bill muttered.

“Want something to eat, dear?” Cheryl asked as she rose from the table and headed for the refrigerator. “A sandwich maybe?”

“That would be great, honey. Thanks.” Bill reached across the table, pulled the laptop in front of him, and quickly scanned the story. “Consider the source, Jack,” he said when he was finished. “It’s the damn
New York Times
. It’s the most liberal rag in the country. It’s even worse than the
Washington Post
.”

“Are you saying the
Times
manipulated this story? That they aren’t telling the truth?”

“I’m saying they have an agenda. Senior people at that newspaper want us out of Afghanistan. Everyone knows that. If you want the straight dope, read the
Journal
.”

“You’re being ridiculous, Bill.”

“And you’re being naïve, Jack. But what else is new?”

“Wait a minute,” Jack snapped. “Are you saying it’s OK to kill a bunch of innocent kids as long as we kill a few terrorists at the same time?”

“Those animals don’t care when they do it to us,” Bill retorted, “as they’ve demonstrated time and time again.”

“Aren’t we supposed to be better than them?”

“It’s a lowest common denominator situation, Jack. You have to fight these people on their level. Force is the only thing they understand. They’re like dogs. You can’t show compassion for them. The minute you do, they take it as a sign of weakness and they attack.”

“Well, I was never very good at math, so I don’t know much about all that lowest common denominator stuff. But I don’t think you can justify killing kids for
any
reason.”

“Why not? They grow up to be terrorists. Kill ’em while they’re young, I say. Before they kill us.”

Jack stared at Bill like he was crazy. “Are you serious?”

“Absolutely.”

“Jesus Christ. I can’t even begin to understand that way of thinking, especially when kids are involved.”

“Let’s talk about something else,” Cheryl pleaded as she pulled cold cuts and a jar of mayonnaise from the fridge and headed for the counter beside the sink. “We’re not going to solve the world’s problems at our kitchen table tonight.”

“I agree, Cheryl,” Jack called over his shoulder. “There’s no reason to—”

“Got any other problems with this?” Bill interrupted as he tapped the screen.

Jack tried to stop himself, but he couldn’t. Sometimes Bill pissed him off too much. It had felt damn good to throw the old man to the floor of the plane up there in the sky, he couldn’t deny that. It was pure macho bullshit, and it was incredibly stupid. But it still felt good.

“You’re damn right I do.”

“Like what?”

“Like it’s not even our country we’re shooting up,” Jack said. “I mean, it’s gotten to the point where we treat the rest of the world like our private gun range. We bomb anybody we feel like bombing whenever we feel like it. We don’t even go to the United Nations anymore to get permission.”

“Get real, Jack. We
are
the United Nations. Why do you think the damn building is in Manhattan?”

“We should still be going through the proper channels. We should be doing it the right way. We’re the good guys.”

Bill groaned loudly. “So we’re supposed to stand by and play it straight while these maniacs who’ve been told that harems of virgins are waiting for them on the other side if they wipe us off the face of the earth train to do it? Is that what you’re saying? Do you really think we’re gonna get permission to bomb the hell out of someplace from a bunch of neutral pansies? Do you really think other countries that don’t have a dog in the fight are going to vote like that in plain sight so these heathens who’ve taken a blood oath to kill anyone who does can see them do it?” he sneered. “Hell, we’re the most powerful country in the world, the most powerful country to ever exist. And you’re right. We are the good guys, we aren’t the evil ones. We shouldn’t have to ask for
anyone’s
permission to do
anything
.”

Jack saw that vein on Bill’s right temple pumping like mad, the way it always did when he started getting really worked up. “Maybe if we tried a little compassion and understanding first, we wouldn’t have to worry so much about wiping each other out.” Jack knew exactly how that sounded to Bill—like giant fingernails screeching down a giant chalkboard—but the chance to see that vein
really
go crazy was too tempting. “Know what I mean?”

“Christ,” Bill hissed. “Let’s get you some sutures for that poor heart of yours that’s gushing liberal blood all over the cowardly left wing.”

“A path of escalation never works,” Jack fired back. “It can’t. Revenge is our enemy. History shows us that.”

“Well, isn’t that profound? Why don’t you tell that to all the kids who lost their moms and dads on 9-11?”

Cheryl grimaced as she fixed the sandwich. “Bill, I don’t think Jack’s saying that we should—”

“And my last problem,” Jack cut in, “is that we’re throwing six hundred billion dollars down the defense black hole every year while we go another
trillion
bucks in the red. At least, that’s what the government tells us we’re spending annually on guns and ammo. It’s probably twice that when you take into account all of that black ops crap our intel people are up to just for fun. We could probably balance the damn budget if we blew up the Pentagon.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “Tomorrow morning I’ll probably read about how some super-secret US unit broke into an apartment somewhere in the Middle East and killed another suspected terrorist leader using some wild new personal cloaking device.” Jack spread his arms wide. “And for what? So another prick with a death wish can take his place? It never ends this way, Bill. The war keeps going on forever. That’s the point.”

“The only way it ends is if we wipe them out.
That’s
the point, you idiot.”

“Bill!” Cheryl spoke up sharply. “Please.”

“So we murder an entire population to kill a few bad apples,” Jack said. “That’s your solution to world peace?”

“It’s the only solution we’ve got.”

“How could we live with ourselves?”

“Happily. I know I could. And I’m not alone, Jack. You might be surprised how many people in this country agree with me and would be willing to use almost any means necessary to wipe out those people.”

“OK, Adolph.”

Bill glared at Jack. “You have no idea what it takes to run the greatest country in the world,” he said in a grave voice, working hard to maintain his composure. “You have no idea how difficult it is to keep the United States safe and how many terrible decisions a few of our leaders have to make every day to do it.” He shook his head as if he couldn’t believe he actually had to say this. “You live in your beautiful little world in Greenwich, Connecticut,
Jack. Protected by men and women of honor who do things you don’t want to know about half a world away so you can live in that beautiful little world. People who would laugh at your fear of heights because they do things that make jumping out of a plane at night look like walking a poodle through Central Park on a sunny afternoon.” He inhaled deeply. “You accept their protection freely and completely even as you despise and denigrate them. It’s pathetic, Jack.”

Cheryl moaned. “Please don’t do this, Bill.”

“Those people you’re talking about love what they do,” Jack answered. “They love their high-tech weapons and their licenses to kill. They love to murder and mutilate just for murder and mutilation’s sake. Most of them don’t even care if they get paid as long as they get to kill or torture somebody once in a while. They’re sadists.”

“Those people,” Bill hissed emotionally, “have more guts in their nose hairs than you have in your entire body. Maybe someday, if you and I are both really lucky, you’ll understand that.”

Troy nailed Sage in the face with a powerful right cross, sending the
Fire
’s captain crashing to the wet, slippery deck. A split second later he took out Duke with a swift, sharp uppercut to the chin.

But before he could spin back around to face Grant, the huge young man barreled into him from the side and sent him crashing to the deck too. Troy tried to get up, but Sage slammed him in the back of the head with a metal bucket. The impact didn’t knock him out, but it rendered his arms and legs temporarily useless and he keeled over. He was aware of Grant and Sage picking him up and tossing him over the deck wall, but there was nothing he could do about it.

As he hit the water and the shock of the freezing temperature revived him, a terrible thought flashed through Troy’s mind. Maybe this was how Charlie Banks had died too. Not on Mount Everest last year as Red Fox One had claimed.